Second Time Around
by SrKeksington
Summary: A man banished for the second time must fight his way out of The Terraria, but this time is different. He's alone... Or is he? Player x Another player, and perhaps a few more ;) Rated "T" for violence, romantic interaction, and mild(?) language. * Finished *
1. Prologue

I don't own Terraria, etc. etc. First fanfic ever!

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 **Prologue:**

Around me, there is hate. There is only hate. The judge speaks, and I almost didn't quite catch it. "Do you have anything else to say?" He booms, quieting the voices in my mind. "Saul?"

Slowly, I raise my head and face him once again. "I am innocent. I will show you, because I _will_ return."

The judge scoffs, and waves his hand. "Take him away."

Guards come and lift me from the chair, before roughly escorting me out of the hall. On my way, I do my best to take my sweet time. I walk slowly, taking a good look at everyone around. Some are random people. The jury. Others are family. My parents, my sister, my brother. On the last day for me. I finally am out of the hall and into the sunlight. Funny how everything seems to hurt you when it's your unlucky day. Even the sun seems condescending. The guards continue to walk me to the Lab of Exile, but I already know the way. These same white steps, the same white walls, it's all engraved in my mind. The guards roughly stop me in front of a short man, with thin eyeglasses and black wiry hair. A stereotypical scientist! He looks me up and down before addressing me. "Saul."

"That's me." I reply in a low voice.

"Good. You know the drill, step on up lucky boy." The scientist turns around and walks over to a large cylinder. He opens one side, revealing a dark purple interior and a teleporter on the floor and ceiling of the cylinder. The two guards holding me remove my cuffs and shove me forward, into the machine. I don't mind. I'll be back soon enough. The teleporters start to glow, emitting yellow light as the only source as the door to the cylinder shut. Outside, I can hear electricity and mana gathering, charging the teleporters.

"Terraria E." The scientist outside says, and flips a switch. Inside, there is a flash of yellow light, and I am no more. I am inside The Terraria E.


	2. Chapter 1

Two views. Not too shabby for two days up. Thanks!

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 **Chapter One: The Basics**

I woke up with the familiar headache, on a familiar patch of grass, with a familiar looking man standing above me.

"Hello! My name is John. I'm the-"

"You're the guide." I butted in. "Your job in this world is to guide and teach me how to survive, I know."

"Umm… Sorry, what?" He asked with a very confused look on his face.

"I've done this before." I said while getting up. "I know how the world works, I've done all this before. I won't need you every step of the way." By now, John looked somewhat hurt, so I attempted to reconcile.

"...But this whole fighting thing is pretty new to me. I've never fought anything stronger than a slime."

He looked up in hope, and I took out my axe.

"I suppose a house is in order." I said, beginning to cut down the tall tree. After a few minutes, I had about 300 wood and some basic surface ores. A bit of copper, even less iron, a few herbs, and a _very_ sudden slug to the back.

"What the-" I stumbled forward and drew my short sword, turning quickly to face my offender, and it was… a little… green… slime. With a burst of anger, I shoved my sword into the little demon, and killed it before it could hit me again. It dropped some gel, and I knew those could make torches, but that was pretty much it. I would ask the guide about that later.

While I was on the surface, I decided to grab some stone as well to make a furnace later, so, I found a small vein, and hacked it away.

"Hey! It's getting a little dark, don't you think?" John asked nervously. His eyes were quickly darting around, looking through the trees at anything that might bite. "You might wanna build something now, right?"

"Yeah, sure. I'm on it." I replied, and put down a newly made workbench. In ten minutes, I was sitting on a chair in front of the fire of a cozy little house. It was rather crowded, as I had set up a few chests, table, chairs, furnace, workbench, and other things inside, but it was a nice crowded, like a well lived in house.

"Well John, I'm gonna try and go to sleep. I recommend you do the same."

"No, Paul, come see this!"

"If it's another zombie, It's okay." I joked.

"No, seriously, it's a girl."

"What?" I quickly stood up looked at him questioningly.

"Seriously!" John said, and ran out the door.

"Hey, wait up!" I grabbed a torch, and ran after him.

He ran a surprising way off into the night before he finally stopped before a dark figure on the ground. I came close behind, and held the torch close.

"Well what do you know..." I muttered.

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Yay! More characters! Chapter two is where the fun really begins!


	3. Chapter 2

Ten views! You guys don't know how awesome this is! Sorry about the huge delay; school started back in full swing, so the chapters are gonna be _much_ farther apart. But don't worry! They're still coming!

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Do you know how hypnotizing fire is? I was about to fall asleep staring into the fire when a movement from the other side of the room caught my eye. Quickly, I turned around, thinking it was the girl waking up, but it was only The Guide. He walked over to the furnace in the wall where I was and sat down next to me, facing the fire.

"How's she doing?" I asked, facing him.

"Not bad. Alive and healing, but still unconscious. At least she's stable."

"That's good. I'm gonna keep doing some world exploration tomorrow if you don't mind."

"Sure thing." He said, turning back to the fire now. "You should probably go to bed now or you'll sleep in midday tomorrow."

"Eh, whatever." I shrugged off his suggestion even though I knew I needed sleep. On second thought, I really did need to sleep now.

"I guess I'll sleep." I told John, and went off to my corner of the little hut.

The next morning, I got up and ate a few mushrooms for breakfast before checking on our guest. She was still sleeping like a baby, so I got my tools together, getting ready to go out, when I heard a rustle from where she was sleeping.

"Hey, John." I whisper-yelled to the sleeping Guide.

"Hmm? What? Yeah?" He spoke with a start, waking up the girl. _Now you've done it_. I think to myself as she bolts awake.

"Who are you? Where am I? Why am I here?" She quickly blasts out at me.

I sigh, and answer her questions. "I'm Paul, this is the Guide, John." John waves his hand in greeting, but her eyes are bolted to me.

"This is my house. You were lying in the grass so I took you inside." I rushed through the second part so she wouldn't get any funny ideas.

"Like I said, you seemed to be hurt, so I took you inside." I finished.

"Well, I'm leaving now." She said, attempting to stand up, but immediately falling back on the chair.

"Hey! You're not healed yet!" The guide exclaims, "You're still not ready to go."

"I'll be fine." She spits out at us, and hobbles to the door, but I quickly move and make it there before her.

"Hey," I said, looking her sharply in the eye. "If this man says something," I gestured to the guide, "You do it. So you're gonna stay here like he said."

"You can't do that!" She exclaimed.

"Yeah, I can. And I will." I stepped outside, but quickly shut the door in front of her and put a few logs in front. With the girl's muffled shouts of protest behind the door, I began to walk away, into the world.

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Oh yeah, a few reviews would be helpful. Thanks!


	4. Chapter 3

Ummmm… Hey. Life happened, and I kind of got bored of this, but I will finish it eventually, be it months, or years in the making. It will be done. Thanks for the two follows!

Man. the dash and equals thing looks _soooo_ much better on Google Docs...

 _Ugh, finally,_ Paul thought as he cleared a hill. He'd gathered a few more surface ores, deforested the area near his shack, and harvested all the herbs to see. He had also dared to poke his head in a cave, before almost losing it to a slime. Not making that mistake again.

But now, it seemed a cave was blocking his path. He sighed, and slowly advanced. Sword in one hand, and a torch in the other. He was just close enough so that the torchlight was beginning to enter the cave, and another despicable slime jumped out. Thankfully, it didn't seem to be interested in him, and it harmlessly hopped around him. Paul relaxed, and walked forward more at ease, and before he knew it, he was twenty feet in the cave with three torches behind him. Oh, and a chest in front of him.

He crouched down to it and slowly opened the chest, revealing an aglet, some potions, a few throwing knives, and some coins. Further inspection found the potions to be hunter potions, so Paul gulped one down just to be safe. He put the aglet on too, but it didn't seem to do anything.

"Oh well." He said aloud to himself, and continued. The dirt walls around him soon gave way to stone, and a rather large drop. However, sounds of water echoed up from the bottom, giving hope of a non-lethal fall. There was no other way down, and Paul didn't have anything to move around it.

 _IhateyouTerrariaIhateyouTerrariaIbloodyhateyouTerr- ChOOOfffssss_.

 _Bloody cold_. Paul lamented to himself, shaking his hair around to dry it. His clothes were a different story though. They would need some serious dry cleaning. He took off his shirt, revealing only his undershirt, and a still really cold Paul. He crawled away from the pool he had landed in, and threw a torch across from him. It landed... at the foot of a door?

Paul slowly approached the door, filled with awe and reverence, but suddenly replaced with disgust. Who would leave such a house in this horrific condition? There were holes everywhere, and it seemed the door was the only solid piece in the death trap on stilts. He creeped into the house (Using the word "house" vaguely), minding the holes, and found a small room before finding there were stairs. There was a pretty chandelier though, so Paul took that.

On the second floor, Paul found a piano, loom, another chandelier, which he looted, but in the middle sat a proud gold chest. He approached it as if it were an altar, and opened it. Inside, he pulled out a glowing boomerang, _not bad_ , a gold coin. _Great!_ And something else at the bottom. It was smaller, just larger than his handspan, and it was at the dead bottom of the chest. Paul stuck his hand in and pulled it out.

He looked at the strange, blue circle before realising his mistake. "WAIT NONONONO-"

 _Brzzzzing!_

He looked around the interior of his house and disgustedly threw the mirror to the ground. "Is something wrong, Paul?" The guide asked, "No." I lamented. "This world has a cruel sense of humor." I heard light snickering in the corner, and looked at our new arrival.

"What? Something funny?" I asked.

"No, just karma biting you back." She retorted. "The Guide said I can go now," She said with an annoyingly happy tone. "I can go now."

I looked at the Guide, and he nodded his confirmation. "Fine." I trudged over to the door, and shoved it hard, removing the logs I had placed there earlier. "You're not gonna last five minutes out there." I told her as she gleefully gathered her belongings. "It's obvious this is your first time in the Terraria." I explained, but my cries fell on deaf ears.

"Whatever!" She said, and waltzed out of my house. I grumbled something about girls and near-death situations and walked back inside. I quickly smelted the ore I had acquired, and once that was done, I fell down asleep, exhausted.

A review would be nice… Please… With a cherry on top… I'll work on chapter four :D


	5. Chapter 4

Started working as soon as chapter 3 was uploaded. Here we go.

That is legit all I wrote when I started. Please forgive me.

Also, THANK YOU SO MUCH, GUEST, FOR LEAVING THAT REVIEW! MY FACE IS MELTING INTO GRINS! THIS FEELING IS AMAZING! THANKS A MILLION!

*phew*

Okay, let's go.

Lol :D

The sounds of bubbling and the light of day assaulted my senses, bringing me to a horrible, groggy morning. I fumbled around on the ground where I had taken my rest and muttered unintelligible things such as "wha?" and "hmm?" and "uhh?" I stumbled around a bit before finally being able to stand up straight.

"Need breakfast?" I rubbed my eyes and looked up at John, my guide. I grumbled an affirmation, and slumped down onto a chair next to the table. As if by magic, John had made a simple mushroom breakfast. I looked at the plate in mild wonder, before digging in.

 **Ten minutes later**

I stood in front of the hot furnace, and drew out a plate of metal. Silver, to be exact. I hammered it bit by bit, and eventually, my labor was rewarded. I held the silver breastplate in front of me, admiring it.

"Are you gonna put it on?" John joked, watching me the entire time.

"No, I think I'll put it on a mannequin." I joked back. I put on the armor, and gave it a motion test. It didn't hinder my movement barely any, and it was stronger than any of the copper armor I could have made, so those were two pluses. I gave John a thumbs-up, and he returned it.

"Well, I'll be heading out for the day." I told him, gearing up.

"Where to?" He asked.

"Eh. Around." I really had no idea where I would go. Probably just run around in circles if I didn't find anything interesting. Maybe I'd find another biome, maybe a giant tree, the jungle, a desert. If I was lucky, I would find a dungeon and maybe… _No._ I corrected myself. _That's what got you here in the first place._ I waved goodbye to John, and headed out. _A bigger house would be nice too._

I felt like a god. No longer did the slimes leave me stunned and wounded, but now they felt like a snowball on my silver armor, glinting in the sun like some legendary weapon. I trekked through the grassy plain where I had entered the world, annihilating any slime inconvenient enough to be standing in reach of my sword. This continued for a little while, before I made sandfall.

There was a desert about a minute to the East of my starter home. As I walked through, making sure to harvest all the cactus, I found that the surface was suspiciously empty of vultures, antlions, and scorpions that normally swarmed over the surface of the desert. Cautiously, I walked along further, and found an unusual hole in the middle of the desert. It seemed already entered, due to the absolutely ridiculous amount of torches and platforms placed inside. _The heck? Have they heard of conserving their resources?_ I headed down, following the path of fire and wood deeper into the cavern.

It lead deeper and deeper, but still was straight. Sunlight continued to cascade down into the stoney walls as I finally reached the bottom. As was the way down, the bottom was smothered with an unholy amount of torches, as if someone was trying to perform some sort of ritual. I was mentally criticizing whoever put these down, when I suddenly heard a shrill scream from a tunnel to my left.

Without thinking, I ran down the tunnel, following the torches. My sword was out and ready for anything… excluding skittering behind me. I glanced over my shoulder, and found a _massive_ freaking bug behind me, I mean, as large as me laid down, and twice as thick.

With very much renewed vigor, I continued running to wherever the torches took me. Thinking fast, I devised an impeccable escape route. I drew out my magic mirror, but made sure not to look at it. I glanced back at the bug, but it was gone. Hopefully I lost it.

At last, after a few turns and over a hole, I found the source of both the screamer, and the one inciting the screamer. It was that girl from earlier, and an even _larger_ bug. It had to be the size of a horse, with wings as long as one too! I hesitated, but dashed ahead again. Time was scarce. The girl was barely keeping the beast away with wild swings from a spear.

"Hey!" I called, and held out my magic mirror. She glanced over with a look of fear plastered to her face, and vanished with a sparkle as the mirror did its thing. The winged insect looked confused for a second, and turned to me, but I had retreated using the same method.

My vision was white, but slowly it went to blue, and then the entire spectrum of colors came back to me as I materialized in my house. My bad, my now overcrowded house. After all, three's a crowd, right?

Hope you enjoyed this chapter! Plenty of arguing next chapter. If you haven't guessed already, the "Terraria E" is Terraria expert mode, and this is the first of it Stephen has seen. This is not your traditional backstory, as the prologue will tell you. I hope you enjoy the way it turns out!


	6. Chapter 5

So…. Haven't been on in a while. Life happened, but mostly my laziness… Sorry 'bout that. Chapter five, here we go!

Wow, I just realised I threw in a "Stephen" at the end of chapter four, I have no idea where that came from. Sorry if that confused you.

Back after a year, saw this after googling my name lol. I played a bit of Terraria, so I'll maybe jump back into this or have some other things up here maybe. School is a bugger.

And the MC's name is definitely Saul. I had a few mixups with Paul and Stephen somehow.

"What were you thinking!" _Oh, yeah, her._ I had just saved her, and did I get a thanks? As if!

"Oh, you know, hunting elephants." I replied sarcastically.

"Seriously? You think this is funny?" She retorted, annoyed.

"Well, it was save you or let you die, take your pick." I was also getting slightly annoyed.

"I wasn't in trouble! I had it totally under control!" She protested still.

"You would have died! By the looks of it, you're a one-time offender, you have no idea what you're doing! I've done this before."

"I would not have! You think I can't kill a few enemies?"

 _ ****Flashback alert****_

" _You think I can't take out a few zombies?" A man stood in a doorway with a wooden bow, firing off into the night._

" _It's not that! It's just… just… Do you have to? What if you do die?" A younger Saul begged._

" _Come on! They're walking corpses for crying out loud, how bad can they b-AAAGH!" The man had turned to reply to Saul, and that had been his mistake. In the split second he turned, a zombie had leapt forward and buried it's teeth in his shoulder._

" _DYLAN!" Saul cried out._

" _SAUL!" Dylan, the dying man cried out. "GET AWAY!"_

" _NO!" Saul yelled back, "I'M NOT GONNA LEAVE YOU!"_

 _Dylan was yanked through the door by now three zombies, and in his last act of protection, he had shut the door, leaving young Saul to suffer with his dying screams forever._

 _ ****End of Flashback****_

"Hey? Hello? Anyone home?" I snapped to attention as the girl in front of me snapped her fingers.

"Yeah, what?" I had totally lost track of the prior conversation, or rather, argument.

"What do you mean when you said, 'I've done this before'?" She inquired.

I scowled. "It means exactly what I said. I've gone through the Terraria before, and apparently after the Terraria is the Terraria E. Clearly, you've never done this before, and this world is harder, so you stand no chance."

"That still doesn't clear it up, you didn't tell me what you did, and I do too stand a chance!" _Oh man, this'll be fun later._

"I committed the highest offense." I said, looking her in the eye, and she was silent.

The room got awkwardly quiet, and even John looked over from whatever he was doing. I sighed, and began to pace around the room.

"You… you can... that?" she asked, incredulously, "I only... killed someone."

Oddly enough, I chuckled. "Shame the majority of the things here aren't humanoid, and you can't go out alone. You'll die, that is a fact."

"No I won't!" She insistently demanded.

"You will." I said flatly, and turned away. _Maybe… No. Forbidden. We'll see as time goes on._ I looked at the ma- mirror. The mirror on the ground, where it had fallen after I dropped it. It twinkled faintly before I shoved it in a back pocket for quick access later. Who knows when it'd be useful.

The girl had started to pace around the room, "What's your name?" I asked.

"Why do you care?"

"Chances are, with you running around like a headless chicken, we're bound to run into each other again."

"...Sophia. That's my name."

"Saul." I said. I would have offered my hand but it likely would have been slapped away.

"Here." I handed her a few recall potions. I didn't need them, as I had the mirror. "If you ever feel like you're in a pinch, chug one and you'll end up here. Better than dying." She took the potions with a pout and set for the door. "Doubt I'll see you again." She said and left.

I sighed and went to the crafting bench, made some torches, and looked at the ores I had. Not much. I had used up most of the silver on the breastplate, had made an iron broadsword, minimal gold, and an abundance of copper. "Back into the world…"

So, a bit of backstory into Saul's previous experince in the _Terraria_. What is the forbidden, ultimate crime? What is in the dungeon? What will the next chapter entale? Will more be revealed about his past?

So his past experience in the _Terraria_ was when the Wall of Flesh (I like to call it Waffle. Wof is only a few letters short of Wofle, or waffle lol) was the final boss, and there was no hardmode really. I played mobile verson a lot, so after the Waffle you could only farm I think Skeletron Prime to get hallowed stuff, and Ocram and that was like the top tier highest stuff you could get from Ocram.

So that's a bit into his past, more will be revealed through flashbacks, dialogue, and thoughts later! See ya!


	7. Finale

Hello. Back again after some time. I think I'll be dropping this fanfic in favor of a new one. My new idea I like more than this story when I started it, and hopefully will be better and easier to write than this one. I've just lost interest in this story. I had a clear beginning and a clear end, but the middle was all muddled, so it'd be awkward and forced to try and continue this.

Apologies to those who liked this story so far, so why not provide a brief summary, eh?

Terraria E is expert mode if you don't already know. The ultimate crime is being a magician. Saul can use magic, and that's why he was sent into the Terraria the first time, with many others. The mages were forced to take melee and ranger roles, but with the guidance of a strong leader, they made it back to the real (real outside of The Terraria, Terraria world) world. Now, Saul reconvened with the survivors, few they may be, about leaving their society and going somewhere else to live, a magical country, but they were apprehended in the middle of their meeting and put on trial, each being sent to their own Terraria E worlds. In the Dungeon lies magic, magical books, and the Water Bolt spell of course. He meets Sophia, and together, they overprepared (courtesy of Saul, they overprepare) and easily eliminate all of the bosses, until Hardmode when Saul begins to wing it. In hardmode, he starts using more magic and reverts to the spells he knew before he was sent into the Terraria for the first time. When the Moon Lord is finally slain, they return to the real world, openly using magic and are taken before the court, where the courts reaches a torn ultimatum. Because Saul and Sophia will simply beat another Terraria E if they send them there again, the Court puts limiters on Saul and a close watch on Sophia. No longer is magic use banned, but now only strictly measured. It hopefully will get better in coming years.

Yep. Sorry again for those who liked this story, but I don't think I can continue it uninspired. I will however, start a new one later which I believe will go for longer, and will be more fun for me to write. A Comedy of Bosses.


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